The Secret Life of Bees is a fairy-tale set in the Deep South in 1964. Lily, a bullied white girl, befriends a plucky black maid, Rosaleen, and they escape together from Lily’s tyrannical dad. After various adventures they take sanctuary at a honey farm run by a commune of astonishingly successful African-American businesswomen.

This story clearly wants to expose the cruelty of whites and the oppression of blacks but the details suggest the opposite. This is a tale of black self-confidence and white failure. Spineless Lily could never have fled her abusive dad without the intelligent and combative Rosaleen to spur her on. And the all-female honey corporation is a fantasy of African-American empowerment. The women sell a homemade brand of ‘Black Madonna’ honey using a label that shows a dark-skinned Virgin Mary. And they rake in huge profits despite doing very little work in the beehive meadows.

They pass their ample leisure hours gossiping about love affairs and strutting around in exquisite cotton blouses, matching skirts, fancy hats, silk stockings, high heels and picture-perfect hairdos. JFK’s wife never lavished so much attention on her appearance. And their finery is on view all day, every day, even in the heat of a South Carolina summer.

As for the story, it grinds to a halt once Lily and Rosaleen reach the honey haven. A few random things happen. Lily’s dad tries to kidnap her. A black boy gets savagely beaten by cops. One of the rich black women marries a needy local creep. And the final scene includes an impenetrable revelation about Lily’s mother who died in odd circumstances, but this hardly affects the characters.

The show looks pleasant enough and the action is interspersed with forgettable songs played by an off-stage band. But the strangest thing about this story of African-American liberation is that it attracted an audience that was overwhelmingly white, even though the white characters are portrayed as vicious thugs who use the N-word constantly. A puzzling spectacle.

White Londoners would sooner die than utter that racial slur and yet they’re keen to hire actors to say it for them. This show isn’t an isolated case. We Caucasians have a boundless appetite for plays that revisit the mausoleum of racist bigotry and remind us how badly we used to treat our black neighbours.

The Only White, another show about racial oppression, is set in South Africa in 1964. A terrorist deposits a suitcase full of dynamite at a whites-only train station. Despite several bomb warnings, the device goes off and kills an elderly white lady, Mrs Rhys. The cops focus on the Hain family who oppose apartheid but who also deplore violence. Did one of their chums plant the exploding suitcase? They tap the Hains’ phone line and harass them by thumping aggressively on their front door. ‘That’s Special Branch,’ says Mr Hain stoically. ‘I’d recognise their arrogant knocking anywhere.’

It gets worse for him and his wife. Both are placed on a ‘banned’ list which prevents them from contacting newspapers or their friends, so they turn to their teenage son, Peter, to smuggle messages out of the house. This is young Peter Hain, later a cabinet minister under Tony Blair, whose first experience of politics feels like an episode of Tintin.

He learns how to sneak through the police cordon carrying letters hidden inside eviscerated onions. He watches a family friend decipher secret messages written on a handkerchief in ‘invisible ink’ (fresh lemon juice). And he learns how to conceal a metal cutter in a barbecued sausage and hide it in a food parcel for a jailed freedom fighter. It’s thrilling stuff although the script focuses more on the cops’ quest to find a culprit than on Peter’s discovery of spy-craft.

The chief suspect, John, admits to planting the bomb after being savagely beaten in prison but Peter refuses to believe his confession. Later, John’s wife blurts out her opinion that the station master is the real murderer because he failed to heed John’s bomb warnings. (This rather gives the game away about John’s role in the crime.)

The story-telling isn’t entirely satisfactory. The Hains believe their house is bugged so they withdraw to the garden for confidential discussions. But they also share incriminating gossip indoors. The drama ends with the shattering of young Peter’s illusions. The man he believed to be a lifelong pacifist is found guilty and sentenced to death. Peter’s ostracised parents ask him to represent them at the memorial service where he reads a lesson from the Gospels. Well, well. A leading Labour figure attends the funeral of a terrorist. Some of us thought that was Jeremy Corbyn’s role. Peter Hain got there first.